Notes from an Alaskan mom reinventing home economics one day at a time!

Monday, March 02, 2009

The Ice Park

Every year, starting the last weekend in February, the World Ice Art Championship takes place here. Ice Alaska hosts it, and all by itself it'd be worth a winter trip to Fairbanks. Artists from all over the world use chainsaws, chisels, and who knows what to create jaw-dropping sculpture that, for the most part, is temporary. (We actually have an Ice Museum, too!) At night the sculptures are lit up with color, adding an all new dimension. Do browse through those links!

But for this family the best part is the kids park and slides. There are mazes and these phenomenal slides, and out on the river they build a plethora of really, really long ice slides. There's reports you can slide as far as a mile this year!

I would love to go at night and wander this outdoor art gallery, but this trip was for the kids. We spent almost two hours in the kids park.

Kiddo in a set of crawl tunnels.

This was easily Junior's favorite slide.

The entrance to the maze. Very smartly designed - labyrinthine, but almost impossible to get lost in.

Yep, that slide looks like a bear.

This one's an airplane. Not sure what the boys are looking at!Junior says, "WAHOOOO!"